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Feb. 25, 2002

Letter to Stuart Fischman about Grammar in Nefesh Hachayim (2002)

General Jewish Thought
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Letter to R. Avrutick about Concerns on the JPS Bible's Translation and Departure from Masoretic Tradition (1963)

Dear Abe, I am putting into letter form, special delivery, some of the thoughts I tried to express over the phone this morning. When the new J.P.S. translation was first announced I did not share the alarm of some of our fellow Orthodox Rabbis. At most, I felt slightly revolted by the cheap publicity. However, I now have some authentic information, in advance of the official publication, that is genuinely alarming and that, I believe, requires immediate action by the R.C.A. which has, at the last Executive Meeting, referred the matter to the Publications Commission for a report in March. I recommend that the commission, or preferably a specialized sub-committee of it, report before February 14th, which is the official publication date for the book.The information came to me from a lay scholar who is an observant Jew and who attended a meeting of the Society of Biblical Literature and Exegesis. (I ask you to keep this particular aspect confidential since I do not want to be revealed to the others.) At this occasion, Prof. \[name omitted] regaled his learned audience with contemptuous references to Orthodox Jewry to which he referred as "the lunatic fringe." He maintained that the restraint the translators felt on their account during the preparation of Genesis was almost completely abandoned by the time they reached Deuteronomy.The major departures from the Masoretic tradition should be sought in footnotes throughout the text which refer the reader to "superior readings" in the Samaritan, Vulgate, and—I believe—Septuagint translations.I would like to refer you and the committee to a particular verse which, according to my informant, can best serve as a criterion for loyalty or disloyalty to the Masorah. That is in Genesis 10:10 where four cities are mentioned, in the land of Shinar, as being in the kingdom of Nimrod. Biblical scholars have identified the first three, but have not excavated the fourth, identified in the Bible as Kalach.Non-Masoretic exegetes have the…
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Letter from Michael Tabor about Yarmulkes in Public, Language, Intellectual Growth, and Music (1973)

My dear Reb Lamm, Shalom! Greetings from London! I have been home for 3 weeks and back north to Sheffield on the seventh, for another 12 week stint. My first teaching practice was, according to my tutor, a baptism of fire! My school (10-11 yr) was in an Education Priority area with 40% immigrants... Many are the tales I could tell you: my experience of what the anthropologists call culture shock – Kfar Chabad then Sheffield!! Suffice, however, one incident which for me is one of the stories of my T.P.Compromise is an inevitable reality that we, as human beings, living as we do in an as yet unredeemed world, are vulnerable to. Well being the sort of Tzaddik that I am(!) I decided that I would wear my kippa at school even though I was warned by well wishers, as well as members of staff, that I was looking for trouble; did I realize the class I was going to take ect ect,.Anyway an the first day, before I took the register I told the class that I would explain why I wear this little black hat at all times. They all accepted it and then one Jamaican girl put up her hand and asked most innocently 'Does that mean Mr Tabor, you are not a catholic!? I had plenty of other problems but none on this score. It was, in retrospect, more an education for me than them and really a wonderful exercise in coming down to earth, to metzamzam my thought and speech. I only hope that my next school stint of 8 weeks in an industrial steel area is o.k. I enclose a copy of a letter sent to me by one of the girls in my class. She was a real richtige.....! I think it is worth more than a long tutor’s recommendation. Intellectually I have been very stimulated by the academic side of the course. It has given me an opportunity to read about what interests me. I am absolutely fascinated by Piaget's research into the growth of concepts within the child's mind and the vital importance of language both as a means of communication and a tool for intellectual growth. Often I wait to shout out: yes, of c…
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Letter to R. Weingarten about Isaac's Blessings to Jacob (1996)

Dear Uzi: Thank you for your piece ויצא חס and the (ethical) problem of the גניבת הברכות. I think you are on target, and your analysis is basically correct (i.e., in consonance with the moral perspective of the Torah and its tendency not to be overtly judgmental but to allow the lesson to be derived from the sequence of the narrative). I liked especially your insights regarding the "name" matter – the literary juxtaposition is beautiful! Time does not permit me to expand on this theme, and we'll have to leave it for when we next meet, אי״ה. Hence, just a few comments, mostly in the nature of תניא דמסייע ליה: 1) See Abarbanel on the beginning of ויצא, where he attributes Jacob's dream to his troubled conscience about stealing the blessings from Isaac. 2) Either Casuto or Benno Jacob has an excellent analysis of the whole incident (similar to yours). One of the things that stands out in my memory: Jacob deceived his father by substituting himself, a younger brother, for an older sibling, exploiting the darkness of his father's blindness. The punishment – מדה כנגד מדה – comes when Laban substitutes an older daughter for her younger sibling under the cover of literal darkness. 3) See Netziv's העמק דבר on ותקח את הצעיף ותתכס as being a symbolic act which colored the relationship of Isaac and Rebecca – a failure in communication between husband and wife, which impeded their talking out problems in their family, which meant they worked at cross purposes even though they really had the same goals in mind – thus creating a situation where deceit became "necessary." That's all for now. Keep them coming – especially the ones you really like. And forgive me if I don't always reply; you may be sure I read carefully what you send. Cordially, Norman Lamm
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